Cauliflower Cous Cous/Rice

Have you tried this yet? If you read the rave reviews online you’re not going to believe it. It is an highly improbable but remarkably plausible substitute. Looks like rice, cooks like rice, feels like rice and tastes… Well, let’s be honest it still like cauliflower, but the flavour is mild and because the feel of it is so different it is easy to forget what it is. It’s especially good if you’re having it with a good saucy dish – like chilli or curry, but then that’s largely the point of rice, so all’s good.

Take a cauliflower. Quarter it and cut away the core. You can use that if it’s not to tough, but it’s nicer just to stick with the florets. Now rip it to pieces and if you’re using the core, dice that up. Put as much into your food processor as it can easily handle and pulverise the cauli into granules about the size of couscous. One-second bursts seem to work best and I usually end up doing a few batches. If you don’t have a food processor then you can grate it fairly easily.

Separate out any lumpy bits and throw those in again with the next batch. You’ll end up with a pile of raw cauliflower rice. which is pretty good on it’s own. But you can complete the conversion with a few minutes cooking to make it even more ‘ricey’.

There’s four options:

1. Bake it. Mix it with a tiny drop of olive oil and spread it out on a baking tray. Bake for about 10 mins at 200C. This keeps the rice fluffy and helps dry it out.

2. Steam it. In a rice steamer or a using a sieve and the right sized saucepan. Let it cook for 4 or 5 minutes. Then wrap it in a tea towel to squeeze out any leftover water.

3. Fry it. For a more sticky consistency, fry it in a tiny drop of oil. Stir it around, then cover and cook for about 5 minutes and it’s ready to serve.

4. You can microwave it. But I don’t like microwaves so I’ll say no more about that.